By DAVID J. HILL

“With renewable energy, we know exactly what it will cost for a long period of time.”

Tonga Pham, associate vice president

University Facilities

Buffalo is a city on the rebound, but the scars of its
industrial past remain visible in the form of vacant properties and
brownfields.

A renewable energy initiative being spearheaded by UB —
and made possible through funding from New York State — aims
to invest in the city’s urban core while reducing energy
costs for a who’s who of Buffalo-area anchor institutions. It
could also help save taxpayer dollars while creating more efficient
budgeting for the participating institutions.

It’s called Localizing Buffalo’s Renewable Energy
Future, and the plan calls for the creation of 100 megawatts of
renewable energy, mostly in the form of solar power, by 2020.

The idea is to build clean-energy installations of varying sizes
— ranging from smaller projects situated in unique urban
environments to large solar farms featuring thousands of panels
— on strategically identified parcels in the city and across
Erie County, as well as on the campuses of UB, SUNY Buffalo State
and Erie Community College.

The power generated by these solar installations would be
consumed by a consortium of regional institutions, including UB,
the city of Buffalo, Erie County, Buffalo State and ECC. The 100
megawatts of renewable energy the project aims to generate equates
to approximately 50 percent of all electricity used by these
entities.

UB’s renewable energy proposal was awarded $1 million last
year through Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s Energy to Lead program.
The program is part of the Reforming the Energy Vision (REV) Campus
Challenge, an initiative sponsored by the New York State Energy
Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA).

The solar installations would be built by developers responding
to a request for proposals. Earlier this fall, UB contracted with
Edison Energy, which will draft the RFP in collaboration with the
university and its partners and then analyze the bids to select the
most cost-effective and on-point proposals and locations.

“The project UB is leading could be a model for other
universities around the nation to follow,” says Chris
O’Brien, Edison Energy’s director of higher education
programs. “We really could see something that’s
transformational on a city level. Our goal as a partner in this is
to help UB and their partners to identify clean, renewable sources
of energy that are financially competitive against traditional
energy sources.”

The solar installations could potentially serve as catalysts for
revitalizing unused land across Buffalo, while providing greater
budget predictability and stability for the purchasers — many
of which are taxpayer-funded — using the power generated. In
addition, the project can help the region reduce greenhouse gas
emissions by more than 82,000 metric tons annually.

Leveraging the power of PPAs

Key to the process is what’s known as a power purchase
agreement, or PPA. It’s a different, more cost-effective way
for large energy users to purchase power. For many bigger
institutions, like a city or a university, annual energy costs are
unpredictable and uncontrollable because the electricity rates vary
depending on the market. Utility costs can fluctuate, but generally
increase over a period of years.

A PPA, however, is a contract that locks in a fixed energy price
over an extended period of time, anywhere from 10 to 30 years. That
means that the buyer purchasing the power — in this case,
Buffalo, Erie County and several colleges — will be able to
know for a long time exactly what their energy costs will be, and
can budget accordingly.

Traditional utility providers aren’t able to lock in rates
for that long.

“This initiative has the potential to create significant
savings for the university and our partners. It allows us to take a
triple bottom line approach that creates cleaner air, better
stewarding of our natural resources, more efficient budgeting and
cost savings,” says Laura Hubbard, UB’s vice president
for finance and administration.

If, after crunching the numbers, UB and its partners determine
the PPA isn’t cost effective, they would not enter into the
contract. “If we’re not saving money, then it would
most likely not be a prudent, strategic move,” Hubbard
says.

While utility costs generally are increasing, the price of solar
has plummeted over the past decade. For example, when UB installed
a small number of solar panels on the roof of Norton Hall on its
North Campus in 2006, solar cost $13 per watt installed. When the
Solar Strand opened in 2012, the price had dropped to $9 per watt
installed.

It’s dropped even further now, to $2.50 per watt at Steel
Sun, the 4.5-megawatt solar power plant on the Bethlehem Steel site
in Lackawanna. UB has an agreement in place with Poughkeepsie-based
BQ Energy to purchase power from this solar plant.

“The problem with commodities like coal and gas that are
extracted is they have peaks and valleys in price. With renewable
energy, we know exactly what it will cost for a long period of
time,” says Tonga Pham, UB’s associate vice president
for university facilities. “Renewable energy allows you to
lock in a fixed rate for 15 to 20 years because you’re not at
the whim of the commodities market.”

For the electricity buyers, there’s no up-front capital
costs because the installations are being designed and built by the
developer. Meanwhile, the developer benefits through tax credits
and other renewable energy incentive programs available, and by
having a paying customer for a number of years.

On top of the savings is the fact the energy is clean and helps
reduce greenhouse gas emissions, O’Brien adds. Currently, 1
megawatt of solar energy is enough to power, on average, 164 U.S.
homes, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association.

UB students on a tour of the Steel Sun/Steel Winds site on the former Bethlehem Steel property in Lackawanna. Photo: Douglas Levere

Connecting to UB’s academic mission

“Our strategy is to think about how to enter into a PPA in
a cutting-edge way, with a number of regional partners, while tying
it into UB’s academic core,” says Ryan McPherson,
UB’s chief sustainability officer and a key architect of the
proposal.

Toward that end, Zoe Hamstead, assistant professor of
environmental planning in UB’s School of Architecture and
Planning, led a studio last spring in which students weighed the
pros and cons of various potential locations for solar projects in
Buffalo.

The UB GRoW Home (Garden, Relax or Work) also factors into the
overall scope of the renewable energy initiative, serving as a
model for incorporating solar into residential properties. Over the
course of its various stages — from winning second place
overall in the 2015 U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon to
being temporarily relocated on the South Campus this fall —
the GRoW Home has provided more than 100 UB students with the
opportunity to put their studies into practice.

While the GRoW Home has been temporarily sited on the South
Campus, it will move to the North Campus as part of the REV
initiative, where it will become a clean energy center for students
and the community.

This fall, Martha Bohm, assistant professor of architecture, has
been leading a design studio focusing on the GRoW Home’s
permanent siting on the North Campus.

Harnessing region’s history with power

A century ago, the Buffalo-Niagara region became a world leader
in harnessing renewable energy from its natural resources and
delivering power directly to the community, thanks to the
innovative efforts of Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse.

The current project has the potential to transform Western New
York into a national and world leader in leveraging the low-carbon
economy while enhancing quality of life across the region.

“This is a big opportunity for Buffalo to be on the
leading edge of a new industry, one that is productive, clean and
renewable, and that provides jobs,” says Edison
Energy’s O’Brien. “It’s not a boom and
bust.”

READER COMMENT

This is fantastic!!! And it is about time!

Maureen Milligan

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Comments

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